Secret Confessions of a Paragrade
by Col.Foley
Summary: Spoilers for ME 3.     Shepard meets Ashley in the hospital and considers the meaning of life.


Secret Confessions of a Paragrade.

**A/N: So this is going to be the first in a short series of Fem Shep one shots set during ME 3. So enjoy, and stuff. I own nothing, Bioware owns all, including my soul. :P **

**And for those of us who are curious my Fem Shep face code is so you can put a face to the character if you so choose: ****.UFC..471.5EB.1D7.C46.G8H.2B3.132**

Commander Shepard, hero of the Citadel, destroyer of the Collectors, first human Spectre, and one last hope to rid the Galaxy of the Reapers once and for all… had a headache.

Not the normal state of affairs for her considering she never had headaches. But she supposed the pressure had to start getting to her sometime. After all she had died once.

Either that or her new 'Prothean' crewmember and the Illusive Man's various plans of daring do were giving her such moral consternations to make her head spin…and then start growling in pain.

She sighed and crossed her arms over her chest and leaned against the wall of the elevator car. She felt her eyes close, flashes of Reaper blasts ripping apart shuttles and humans screaming as she had to flee in the _Normandy_, leaving them all behind. Then flashes of gun fire, of hot metal tearing through the air over her head as she just had enough time to duck.

She flinched her eyes fluttering open as the intercom announced neutrally "Now arriving at Huerta memorial Hospital."

She uncrossed her arms and straightened out her standard issue 'N7 hoodie' with a vicious tug and yank before walking through the door.

Huerta wasn't looking too busy…yet. The war hadn't really hit this place too hard. Most of the combat casualties and people fighting were being treated in field hospitals thousands of light years away from here.

Still she was convinced that was bound to change any minute now.

There were already signs of that.

An Asari psychiatric patient talking to an Asari Doctor about her front line action on a human colony that was hit by an advanced Reaper scouting party.

A line at a receptionist's desk that was starting to grow longer by the second. Doctors and techs screaming for and checking their omni tools or calling contacts for medical supplies, bio amps, and specific types of Medi Gel.

But it was pure chaos next to what was going on outside the walls, through the large glass windows overlooking the rest of the Citadel proper.

It was inherently peaceful, but deceptively so as sky cars drifted and rocketed by the windows trying to get to their destinations. Cracks were starting to appear in the veneer of peace and Civilization. Huerta bore testament to this fact.

She shivered slightly trying to think about happier things but finding it difficult to in a world gone mad.

But she still had to put on a brave face, and say the right thing to get her people back together again.

Namely one Ashley Williams.

She was taken out on Mars and was just on the mend. Shepard hadn't had that much time to see her again since going off and saving Palaven from yet another Reaper force…or at the very least escorting the brand new Primarch off the planet so that he could organize a war summit.

A war summit that the Asari had already backed out of while the Quarians were nowhere to be seen.

Somehow Shepard suspected that she was going to be left holding the bag. Again.

She headed through the door at the opposite end of the room, passed the receptionist desk on her right and the Sirta store kiosk on her left.

She walked straight through to the glassed walled corridor which let her watch doctors and attending physicians check out on whatever it was that they were doing at any particular point in time, as the scanners whirred above her head dousing her in blue light.

Straight through the door at the opposite end of the corridor, turning right, into Ashley's room.

_At least the view is nice._ Shepard thought with a smile.

It was overlooking the wards, the various promenades and gardened rows blossoming green in the perfect environmentally contained space station, looking as endless as any city on any planet, millions going about their daily lives, each stacked up one on the other. Leading all the way down to the central pools and geysers of water.

She smiled at the sight then turned to Ash. _Well she is still asleep_. Shepard frowned wondering if she should leave or not.

She took a ginger step back trying to leave the way she came quietly in order not to disturb her friend.

Ash grunted her body spasmed and she gasped slightly, Shepard froze the door whirring behind her.

Ash sighed again and craned her head around blinking a few times focusing her eyes. "Shepard?" She asked.

"Lieutenant Commander." Shepard grunted out trying to be formal given that she wasn't quite sure where the two of them stood with one another. She had made some pretty severe charges on Mars.

Some days she wondered if half of them were true. But it was all about keeping up the brave face.

"Commander." Ashley started again nodding this time.

She was bruised, badly, her entire face.

Shepard winced. She didn't realize it at the time but 'Eva Core' was a mech, and probably an AI to boot that Cerberus had snuck into the Prothean research facility. So the damage that a normal human could do was a lot less drastic to what was sitting before her now.

But she did look better; at least she was awake this time.

"Please sit down." Ashley said nodding to the chair at her bedside.

Shepard nodded smiling moving to sit down straddling the chair delicately.

"How've you been Williams?" She asked, but then winced at the obvious.

"Been better ma'am." Ashley smirked her eyes dancing playfully.

"I noticed" She smiled sympathetically.

"But at least I'm on the mend though right? At least that's what the Doctors say. Beginning to go stir crazy here."

"Take your time I'd rather have you ready to be in the fight then rushing in blind before you get ready just to get yourself, or me, killed." She countered teetering on the edge of an order and concern of a friend.

"Yeah I know." Ashley frowned. "Sorry about how I treated you on Mars. I'm still trying to get used to the idea of you being back. Been so busy recently with the promotion and the new orders carrying on and then from Earth falling."

"Did your family make it out OK?"

Ashley nodded, "Yeah, Sarah got out just fine. But her husband got killed, on the front line duty trying to get some colonists out of Eden Prime. Isn't that just funny the place where this road show started and it just happens to be the same place that my sister loses the man she loves."

Shepard suppressed a small shudder boiling up through the pits of her stomach and spreading throughout her body and her chest.

"I am so sorry to hear about the loss of your family Ash."

Her friend shrugged. "Yea, so am I. I heard that Sarah is putting together a memorial service on the Citadel…but I imagine that it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better."

"Yeah…probably is…" She sympathized.

She didn't know what else to say. Earth was burning and everyone she knew was paying the price in some way or another. And it seemed as if the Galaxy was bound and determined to join them in that hell that they were creating for one another and for the rest of time.

People too busy defending their boarders or worrying about their little concerns to present a united front and say that this would be the line in the sand.

She wanted it to be Earth. But she understood their warnings and their misgivings about protecting their own boarders. It could've been anywhere. Palaven, Sur'kesh, Thessia, the Terminus Systems. She really didn't care as long as someone stood and began working together with the rest of the Galaxy to defeat the Reapers.

She would've rather it had been Earth but someone had to stand.

Instead they were all running to their own boarders and trying to secure themselves before even considering anyone else.

It made a certain amount of sense from a purely military perspective and by pure common sense, secures yourself before you go secure others. But since the Reapers were so encompassing and so powerful nothing really stood in their way and conventional tactics were being ripped to shreds.

Even if she succeeded with bringing the Krogan and Turians together in a united front against the machines she suspected it was just going to be a holding action.

Eventually the Reapers, with their superior tactics, numbers and millions of years of experience, were going to whittle them down. The fight may take hundreds of years before every last man woman and child were reaped from the face of the Galaxy but the war effort couldn't last that long. They would run out of effective military strength and capable fighting forces long before then.

Just leaving individual colonies to be flapping in the wind and waiting to be harvested.

And of course the Reapers were brilliant enough to draw their enemies into main line engagements over their home worlds, forcing their opponents to waste hundreds of ships in vein efforts, cutting them off from the rest of the colonies so they could be taken out piece meal, or to be dealt with later by Cerberus forces.

It wasn't a good way to fight a war and an even less way to go. The Reapers didn't really have to fight at each sector just take out key assets and then let people starve.

It was depressing as hell. She sighed lowering her head.

"Shepard, do you believe that we are deserving of survival?"

Shepard looked up at her for a second arching an eyebrow considering the question and considering where it even came from.

"What do you mean?" She pressed her friend.

"You know…after all that we have done to each other. And the Krogans and the Yahg and all the evil in the world. Maybe these civilizations really do deserve all that we get."

"Wow," Shepard paused crossing her arms over her chest and staring at her friend, "coming from you that sounds pretty severe."

Ashley hissed…what passed for a laugh in her current state. "Yeah I know me the God believer. Who believes the world was created for a purpose. Yeah I know."

Shepard thought about it for a minute staring at the floor.

"You know I find this question a lot like the one 'does God exist?'"

Ashley craned her neck wincing and gave him a look. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"I just don't think the question matters that much. Whether there is a God or whether we survive or not isn't a matter for philosophical theory. It comes down to cold hard facts on the ground, in the trenches. Do we deserve to survive? Does God exist? In my personal opinion He does and we do, and there is a plan."

"But then what about the millions upon millions of cycles before ours and all those sacrificed species?"

She shrugged. "I don't know Ash."

"That's it?"

"That's it. I believe that free will comes into play and that sometimes bad shit happens. You don't have to take a long hard look at the world to realize that fact. The universe is a dangerous place Ash. But if God really did create the universe He did so with the potential for the Reapers, and the Batarians, and the Genophage, and that we make our own decisions."

"But-" Ashley tried to butt in again.

"But then we have to act like we are worthy of survival. As if we are all alone and all this matters to us, and then hope to heck some force out there is watching our backs. It's a balancing act but again one that is ultimately academic. Because if we think we aren't worthy of survival then we will die and none of it will have mattered much to begin with."

"Well…since you put it like that." Ashley muttered trying to get comfortable.

Shepard grinned. "Certainly puts things into perspective. Difficult enough battling control freaks in the Illusive Man and the genocidal revenge wielding Prothean. Trying to pick the scales between those two philosophies and do the right thing."

She gave him the eye.

"Long story Williams. Our Prothean seems bound and determined to get his revenge on the Reapers for wiping out his people. And while I agree with him on principle…just in my experience anyone who wants revenge for the sake of revenge usually doesn't end up well for anyone really. As in getting everyone on the ship or squad killed as he rushes off in a blind rage, unable to see other alternatives."

"I heard about him…" She whistled. "Buried under Eden Prime for fifty thousand years and to wake up, to discover that your people were gone, damn straight I'd be pissed too. And with the Reapers on Earth I can't believe you don't want revenge too. Still we must've been quite the shock to him."

She held up her hands placating. "I do…but someone has to keep perspective and keep a short leash…God do I want to. And yes, back in his day we were a bunch of primitives stuck grooming ourselves and crouching in our own poop."

Ashley hissed again.

"Well…I should get back to it." Shepard said with a nod.

"Yeah, shove a tentacle up a Reaper's ass for me will you?"

"I will." She nodded before leaving.

A spring in her step now that she had something to look forward to, she was right. If she just sat there and gave into her depressions and fears then the entire universe would fall apart. She hated that she was in that position but she seemed to be the only one willing and capable of doing something about it.

No pressure at all, but the alternative was that they just die.

With that thought she returned to the _Normandy_ giving Joker an order as the ship rocketed back to the Salarian home world, and onto another minor crisis.


End file.
